Any allegations of a bullying culture in the Bay of Plenty District Health Board are being "taken seriously" by the board's chief executive Helen Mason.

'Any allegation that the Bay of Plenty District Health Board in any way condones bullying in its organisation is strongly rejected,” says Helen.

'The DHB is firmly committed to an anti-bullying culture. We take any allegations of inappropriate behaviour very seriously.”

CultureSafe NZ Ltd director Allan Halse made the accusation saying the board has acted badly towards a client who raised a complaint under the Protected Disclosure Act 2000.

When hospital staff were told about a meeting, which was called at extremely short notice, wasn't to proceed without a CultureSafe NZ Ltd representative present, an attempt was made to force the client to attend, says Allan.

Distressed, the client left the hospital and was granted two weeks stress leave by her doctor.

'It's quite unusual for even the worse organisation to force attendance at meeting without allowing representation,” says Allan in a Facebook post.

'We know that the Board has not responded to CultureSafe NZ Ltd's request for an investigation into bullying/harassment by three managers and one HR personnel that was condoned by the chief executive Helen Mason,” says Allan. 'In fact, it seems that they have taken the ostrich approach and have buried their heads in the sand.”

In a statement released to SunLive, Helen says the cases referred to were looked in to as soon as they were brought to their attention.

'However, we do not comment on individual cases for privacy reasons and would not comment on cases which are currently before the Employment Relations Authority,” says Helen.

'The DHB's commitment to tackling inappropriate workplace behaviour has been demonstrated through the ‘Creating our Culture' programme of work over the last 18 months. ‘Creating our Culture' includes a workstream specifically focused on ‘inappropriate behaviours' and is one of the DHB's four key strategic priorities.

'This programme is sponsored by the Executive Management Team and is strongly endorsed by our Board. It has included over 2000 staff member interactions, through surveys, attendance at workshops, and continuing work to develop further workshops, tools and templates,” says Helen.

'We have received a lot of very positive feedback about the programme, from staff, our employee union partners, and our patients, and are proud of what it has achieved to date. It is impossible to work at the BOPDHB without being aware of how much the values and expected behaviours highlighted by Creating our Culture matter to us all.

'This year, we are also adding the internationally-approved Cognitive Institute approach to tackling ‘inappropriate behaviours'. This work will be carried out in partnership with our four main employee unions.

'The Cognitive Institute undertakes careful vetting of any organisation wanting to work with them and have recently assessed and validated our Board and Executive Team's commitment to creating an exemplary workplace culture for everyone.

'Changing an organisation's culture takes time and we recognise we are on a journey. It is a journey we are fully committed to.”